Having successfully operationalised the first two of the 6 X 1,000 MW Pressurised Water Reactors (VVER) to be built at Kudankulam with Russian technology, the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited, the proponent of this ambitious project, will commence construction of the third and the fourth reactors at Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project site on Saturday.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Narendra Modi will formally inaugurate the ‘base concreting work’ in the deep trench dug for the third and fourth reactors through videoconferencing from Goa at 1.05 p.m. on Saturday even as the leaders are attending the 2-day BRICS summit at the southwestern Indian State.
“Though the ‘First Pouring of Concrete’ for the third and fourth reactors will take place during the first quarter of next year, the leaders will inaugurate the ‘base concreting work’ on Saturday,” sources in the KKNPP told The Hindu .
After commencing the excavation on February 17 last, digging of earth on the sprawling KKNPP site for the upcoming reactors moved to top gear even as separate state-of-the-art administrative building came-up nearby. The NPCIL, which has planned to complete the construction of third and the fourth reactors on an outlay of Rs. 39,747 crore, has set a target of taking these two units to criticality stage by 2022.
Meanwhile, the second reactor, which was stopped on September 7 last for scheduled fine-tuning after it attained criticality on July 10 last, has so far generated over 50 million units of power while its ‘elder sister’ has produced over 12,300 million units, including the infirm power.
